Product Description

Studio: Uni Dist Corp. (mca) Release Date: 05/01/2007 Run time: 101 minutes Rating: R

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #65112 in DVD
• Brand: Universal
• Released on: 2007-05-01
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 2.40:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Color, Dolby, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: English, French
• Dubbed in: French
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 3.00 pounds
• Running time: 84 minutes

Amazon.com
20 years is a long time in the lifeline of movie plot-arc necessities. It's also a pretty big generational stretch in the lives of audience demographics, which may be part of the reason the producers of this remake of the 1986 cult horror classic felt the need to update the original spare mano-a-mano backbone into a girl-and-mano-a-mano. The Twilight Zone-ish setup is still a pretty neat idea: regular guy on a lonely highway picks up a hitchhiker who turns out to be a psychopathic killer with some very unsettling supernatural might. Fans of the original could hardly hope for a demon villain with such creepy charisma as Rutger Hauer. But Sean Bean makes a respectable replacement, with his understated stare and stewing rage that brings a new brand of hair-raising devilry to the role of hitcher John Ryder. The lone "good guy" originated by a boyish C. Thomas Howell has been upgraded to a lovesick couple. In a twisty touch, Jim (Zachary Knighton, sorta unknown) and Grace (Sophia Bush, of One Tree Hill fame) trade gender roles, with Jim turning wimpy and feminine and Grace becoming a shotgun-toting testoster-ette. The body count's a little higher and the gore factor increased by the power of 20 (years), but some of the original film's set pieces remain much the same-- body-snapping case in point being an 18-wheeler being put to use as a old-fashioned torture rack. While the original might have placed a bit more emphasis on the philosophical and existential elements of evil passing from soul to soul, it wasn't exactly an intellectual thrill ride. Likewise, 2007's The Hitcher is no art film, and it can't be faulted for choosing fright and might for audiences that are always looking for bigger and more elaborate splats for their horror entertainment buck. And if you stick out your thumb for this one, expect plenty of splat. --Ted Fry

Customer Reviews

Road-Killer
"The Hitcher" is a so-so film that desperately wants to be a killer music video. Starring Sophia Bush (that One Tree Hill girl who is so pretty it makes my eyes water) and Zachary Knighton (I'd never heard of him before, but he looks like the type who'd date Sophia Bush), the film wastes no time with pleasantries. The two lovers hit the road, and then the road hits back.

The road in my oh-so-clever analogy turns out to be John Ryder, the hitcher, a man with a grudge against life. Literally. In one of his first lines of the film, Ryder admits that the reason he tortures, maims, and kills people is because he wants someone to stop him. This sort of Swiftean take on nihilism is often used by scriptwriters to give a character license to indulge in flat-eyed melodrama (emotive beef jerky, I call it), but Sean Bean -- as the unflagging madman -- lets his desperation and his senseless rage simmer without boiling over into false theatrics. Bean is really the reason to watch this film.

It's too bad he's not in it more than he is. Most of the time we are forced to watch Bush and Knighton wander around making typically bad decisions and then griping or whining about it to each other when there's a break in the action.

I don't blame the actors. These sorts of brash bonanzas of violence and destruction don't really need much in the way of plotting to do their job, but they do need some kind of decent writing. I mean, take a look at Spielberg's Duel. For a movie with such a minimal plot and perhaps two pages of dialogue, this film works macabre magic. "The Hitcher," in lieu of compelling characters and a solid build-up of tension has, instead, the rat-a-tat-tat subtlety (and pace) of a semi-automatic. Short bursts of loud chaos, interspersed with brief moments of silence. You don't want that barrel to melt.

I give the film a thumbs up for its dervishes, for the car chases (set to blaring Nine Inch Nails), the near-misses, and the bold direct hits (I'll admit that I was shocked and surprised by the scene with the semi-truck and the chains). But, just like the (lack of) beliefs of the title character, the movie doesn't seem to care about much of anything, making it easy for the viewer to feel likewise.

Fantastic Hitcher remake!
I was a huge fan of the orginal film The Hitcher, and was very excited to see a remake being made in 2006. I was reluctant to rent it because I aboslutely loved the orginial. It was one of my all time scariest, creepiest movies that I've carried images of in my mind for two decades.

Now, I am happy to say--I've just rented The Hitcher and don't want to return it to the videio store! This movie is a keeper! The special effects are fabulous, the actors superb, and I am thrilled and delighted with this remake.

I feel it is a true piece of creative and thrillingly creepy and eerily wonderful horror!

Thank you for this film!

Sincerely,
Star

Leave this hitcher on the roadside and get the original.
If there was ever a pointless remake of a film, then this one is it.

Not even Sean Bean can salvage this wreck of a film and I'm a huge fan of his work and it matters little if he's a bad guy, as in National Treasure, or an average "Joe", as in Flightplan. This film offers no reasonable reason for remaking a cult classic. This film is an almost shot for shot remake of The Hitcher with C. Thomas Howell and the great Rutger Hauer but lacks all the genuine chills and suspense that the original had.

In the original, Hauer's hitcher was more evil incarnate than a real flesh and blood character and this film's flaw is that Bean seems all too real. He's just your average psychopath that we hope to never meet whereas Hauer's hitcher is was an evil presence we feared finding us no matter where we might be. He was soulless and happy to be so. Bean's hitcher seems to have not only a soul, but also a conscious. He wants to be stopped. It's like a plea for help. We got none of that "touchy feely" crap with Hauer's villain.

To continue to berate this remake is rather pointless and so is this remake. Go rent the original shocker and enjoy some genuine thrills instead of this senseless mess.